31 January 2010

Selling Covered Calls

While options are generally the lair of the expert trader, there can be some cases where using options can behoove even the casual investor.

Covered calls represent an opportunity for investors to limit their downside at the expense of some of their upside. In certain markets and circumstances this can be a very desirable outcome.

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8 August 2009

Should You Be In the Stock Market?

Recently, participation in the American Stock Market reached as high as 50% of the U.S. population. With so many people invested, the question remains: Should they all really be in there?

How did so many people decide the stock market was right for them? Are they rational?

We address these questions and more and help you decide if you should be in the stock market or not.

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26 July 2009

76 ETFs For Foreign Stock Exposure

ETFs can provide an easy way to gain exposure to the markets of foreign countries. Unfortunately gaining access to which ETFs are available is not as easy of a task.

In this article we provide a master list that we plan to update of International ETFs you can use in your portfolio.

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4 April 2009

5 ETFs That Can Help Balance Your Portfolio

While I generally advocate against investing in individual stocks for amateur investors, I make some exceptions for ETFs. Exchange Traded Funds are funds that trade on the stock market like a regular stock, but represent managed funds like mutual funds.
These ETFs give you an opportunity to hedge your stock market positions and provide some balance to your portfolio fairly easily. While I would still recommend a lot of research before buying any of these, each of these ETFs gives you some ability to round out your positions.

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22 February 2009

Investing Step 10: Techniques

Once you’ve decided how your money should be allocated, it then becomes a matter of execution. There are many details that can make a tremendous difference in how your returns are realized. How you get your money into its allocation is nearly as important as what allocation you choose.

Some key techniques are diversification, dollar cost averaging, index funds and rebalancing.

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20 February 2009

Investing Step 9: Allocation

After all your tax-deferred accounts are being used to their maximum potential, it is time to fund any other accounts. Once that is done, you need to start deciding how to allocate your funds. This is the problem that many people did not properly address before the real-estate bubble burst and is the most important step to maximizing your returns.

The key components in making these decisions are time horizon and risk aversion.

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